


We’re restless for a reason

by Bumbleberry



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Between Episodes, Canon Compliant, Cup of China, First Kiss, Friends to Lovers, Hasetsu, M/M, Rostelecom Cup
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-17
Updated: 2019-04-14
Packaged: 2019-11-21 15:50:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 14,443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18144239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bumbleberry/pseuds/Bumbleberry
Summary: Viktor was somehow both making love to the ice, and tucking it into bed as it’s father. A dichotomy of innocence and sexuality. His every move a murder of expectation.Neatly completing a triple toe loop; one golden skate kisses the ice again, the other swinging up toward the ceiling. His body was strung and precise yet moved effortlessly. An angel learning sin.-Follows canon story, but with little embellishments between scenes





	1. An angel learning sin

**Author's Note:**

> I was just writing a little piece about Viktor’s beautiful skating and it became this. It will follow the story, but sort of embellished. Sometimes Yuri seems really distant so I tried to offer some perspective on that.

He was somehow both making love to the ice, and tucking it into bed as it’s father. A dichotomy of innocence and sexuality. His every move a murder of expectation.

Neatly completing a triple toe loop; one golden skate kisses the ice again, the other swinging up toward the ceiling. His body was strung and precise yet moved effortlessly. An angel learning sin.

 

With his silver hair blown back- his brow was exposed, balancing concentration and poise. Eyes bright with focus. There was something inhumanly graceful about him, like he was tampering with existence. Framing dreams as reality. Bewitching us all with nothing but the movements of his body.

 

The music was aching and alive; the kind that seeped under your skin and inflated your chest, made your heart dizzy with pressure. It called to us, each instrument impossibly wound around the other, barely allowing the slash of ice through. It was dance and skating and something else entirely.

 

When he came to a stop in the centre, body tucked tight, arms holding his ribs together like they might burst; it was a breath before they realised it was over. Shook themselves from the spell. The lines of him were still quivering, lingering on that final note, when the stadium erupted with crude music of its own.

The heaving breaths were unreal, cuttingly human, as he unfurled and straightened. A smile- exhausted and pleased. Sweat painting the height of his cheekbones.

 

He glides off, between bouquets, legs ever lithe. Maybe he wasn’t an angel or fey- but his skates were still his wings.

 

And here was I, and everyone, mortals, thinking we knew what skating was. Thinking any amount of practise would let us know the ice as he did. Thinking we ever had a chance of seducing it.

 

My body ached, disappointment bruising my skin and yet he’d given me a taste of that feeling. Watching him had been a window in.

I’m glad I’d come round to see him, forgotten the defeat rattling my chest, if only for minutes.

 

He’s walking to the kiss and cry now, steps heavy still with his skates. As he passes me I see the exhaustion in him, the tremor of his thighs and how he’s favouring his left leg. Looking ahead with unseeing eyes, his jaw tight with something that looks like pain.

 

Yakov greets him with customary gruffness but brings him back with a hand on his shoulder and quiet words in time for the cameras. On the big screen he’s smiling again, leant forward on his knees and looks almost cocky.

 

When the score comes through, it’s high, extremely. Not his personal best but close. Definitely enough to secure him a medal if not gold. He knows it, you could read it in every line of his body, sure he looks pleased but there’s something else.

 

Yakov is delighted, the folds around his eyes lift for a moment as he ruffles the silver head of hair beside him, disrupts the neat side part.

 

It’s no surprise when half an hour later he’s stood on the centre podium; hair hiding his eyes as he bows his head to receive his medal. Gold, like his skates. It falls back heavily to his chest when he straightens. Viktor Nikiforov, 5th consecutive Grand Prix champion.


	2. Idol incarnate

Minako had left. She’d fussed and stalked about my room for half an hour, struggling to maintain a straight line and stinking of drink when she veered in too close. But I hadn’t anything to say to her.

 

I wanted to pity her with her empty studio and long-gone successes, but I saw some of myself in the desperate loneliness. Saw the stinking pit my career had become. The rotting stench choking me whenever I thought of it.

 

And now the damn video. It was clean at least, no falls or trips. But then I had always skated well in practise.

 

There’s a ghostliness to the way I move it in; bright lights turning me beyond pale and I see a flicker of what I was. What I could have been.

 

It makes me notice the difference in my body now to how it had been before. The ease with which muscle spends away and fat fills in the spaces. I’m plenty fit now but nothing like I was.

 

There’s something in the way I’m skating. At the time I’d felt nothing and I’d skated with the numbness, let it lead me. Viktor had skated it differently, all elegance and sensuality but seeing myself now- I looked tranquil. Near blissful in my hopelessness.

 

I was moving for nobody but myself and Yuuko. For my love of the ice. There’s a complete lack of desperation that is equal parts mesmerising and somber. It feels like a last dance.

 

I watch myself finish, face flushed and breathing hard, tentatively looking towards the camera. Unaware.

 

There’s a lot of views. Enough that I feel nauseous. Not only that people will hate it or mock me, but that something personal and important was stripped from me. Sharply and unexpectedly.

 

And Minako had actually thought that I’d uploaded it. The thought nearly amuses me, that I would have the guts.

 

Sinking to the floor calms me. It’s the same as it’s always been. Firm and real under me. A faint heat from the hot springs. I breathe slowly until I can pretend I’m a child again, curled foetal and counting the knots in the wood until I’m asleep.

 

-

 

It was days before I re-emerged. The blankets having moulded into something of a nest around me. They’d held their shape when I was finally bullied into showering, and I’d nestled back into my warm cave after, adopting the exact same position.

 

Now my mom is hammering on the door; the only thing between me and my companion, eternal slumber.

 

“Come out and shovel the snow.” She insists, with that warm persuasive voice that always feels guilty to rebuff. I snuffle my head out, probably mirroring a bear rising after hibernation. _Wait snow_?

 

I rip the curtains open and stare, astonished, at the white glaze finishing the landscape. There’s snow balanced on the pink thickets of cherry blossom. A bizarre juxtaposition of seasons.

 

How could I not have- of course. My phone had been on silent, face down with shame, on my desk.

 

I tuck it under my pillow now, still turned off, and hunt for my coat. It had been shucked into the cupboard somewhere, unsuspecting of a sudden snowfall.

 

By the time I’m suited and booted up for the chill, armed with a shovel,I could probably take on the Himalayas. Probably.

 

Though I’d heard the dog barking all morning, it still surprises me when I open the door to a bundle of curls and bright eyes. It cocks its head benignly and is so alike Vicchan, I’m stumped...

 

Until it leaps up against my chest with more weight than Vicchan had been soaking wet, and I’m flailing backwards onto the floor. It’s tenacious in it’s affections and I half heartedly twist to evade its kisses.

 

There’s something familiar in the shiny brown coat and dark nose, outside of it’s resemblance to Vicchan. If I didn’t know better I’d say-

 

“Morning.” Dad strolls up, characteristically jolly even lugging a tray of towels. He smiles down at the dog still on my chest, comments on the similarity of it to Vicchan, with crinkled eyes.

 

“His owner’s a new guest. Some good looking young fellow with an accent. He’s in the spring right now.” He says conversationally but my throat has closed.

 

I’m already scrabbling to my feet and swerving around him as he calls after me. It can’t be but-

I burst through the door to the baths but several middle aged men just look at me bemusedly.

 

I’m still slashing a hand through the condensation on my glasses when I make it to the outdoor hot spring and freeze. Because he’s there.

 

Just leant against the edge. Flushed from the heat and skin shining with water. His silver hair has twisted into strands with the condensation and-

 

“Viktor...” I say because I’m definitely delirious. But he makes a quiet hum against the bubble of the spring and makes to stand.

 

Except that he’s naked. Why is he naked? _Why?_

 

“Hello Yuri,” He calls across and I want everyone and no one to say my name the way he does. Accent remoulding the sound.

 

He’s stood side on, hand outstretched towards me likes he’s offering me a dance, body taut. There’s pale skin and sharp muscle and his hair is almost blue against the snow and I can’t breathe.

 

“Starting today I’m going to be your new coach. You’re going to get to the Grand Prix final and you’re going to win.” His voice drops at the end and I’ve officially entered fight or flight mode. And he’s just stood there waiting and watching, and I’m twitching with the effort of not looking down but there’s my peripheral vision which I simply can’t control.

 

Jesus, he’s beautiful and he’s here, in my home. Wanting to coach me. Then he drops his arm and smiles warmly with a pleasant hum, as if he’s pleased with his delivery, and drops a wink.

 

“Uh okay...” I say and my hanging mouth closes for the first time in several minutes. I dry swallow.

 

“Okay,” I repeat “I’ll let you... uh soak.”

 

“Of course. We will discuss after. Is there food?”

 


	3. Pathetic

Viktor devours the meal placed in front of him with apparently no concerns for the calorific count. His hair is still wet and darkening the shoulders of his robe.

 

I sit in awed silence, watching him eat. Baffled. The entirety of his attention is currently monopolised by his bowl of food and every few mouthfuls he makes happy sounds.

 

But as soon as he nears finishing, scraping the bottom of the bowl, I find myself darting out to help my mom in the kitchen. My idol is at my table and I’m too terrified to even face him.

 

The green robe had been dangerously close to slipping down one shoulder, not that I hadn’t already seen that shoulder. Seen much more than that shoulder.

 

To say Viktor had been a corner stone in my inkling that perhaps I could also find men tasteful, was an understatement. Viktor had been that inkling. I’d been maybe 12 when I’d first thought that perhaps Yuko and I should be viewing him in different lights. That my ‘idol’ was spilling over into my crush. That most young teens were using playboy magazines rather than Viktor Nikiforov posters to amuse themselves.

 

Still, that was then. Now I viewed him strictly as a professional figure skater.

 

So I clench my teeth and march right back out, because I’m a grown man and can have a functioning conversation with a fellow skater. Except that his bowl is empty and seat vacant.

 

A soft whistling has me peering around the table to see him splayed on the floor; towel under his head and poodle against his side.

 

“Isn’t he sweet,” Mom coos from behind me, drying her hands on a towel. “He must be exhausted.”

 

She strolls back out and I can hear her bustling again in the kitchen. I sit, and I stare. Mostly because I’m unconvinced that I’m not dreaming.

 

Robe splayed halfway open to the chill and wooden floor beneath him, he can’t be comfortable. And yet he slumbers quietly, fingers twitching.

 

Why is he here, offering to coach me? He’d barely even recognised me as a fellow competitor at the Grand Prix and now I’m worthy of his teaching. After the announcement in the hot spring, there had been no further explanation and at dinner he’d been more concerned with his udon noodles than with elaborating. And since when was he even coaching? Did this mean he was retiring, was I just an excuse to get out?

 

The tight nervous clench in my gut was back and my head throbbed.

 

I hadn’t moved when Minako bursts in with my mom.

 

“Look at him, he’s sleeping soundly as a baby.” Mom is using her pet voice usually reserved for babies and dogs. At least Minako looks as disbelieving as me.

 

“And why is he passed out on the floor in one of the Inn’s robes?” She shrieks and it’s testament to Viktor’s exhaustion that he just snuffles and rolls over.

 

“Uh well-“

 

“It’s all over the news in Russia. They say he’s taking the next season off to consider the future of his career.” She’s hissing and has taken on her scolding teacher voice.

“Apparently he saw the video of you skating his routine and was so inspired by your performance that he decided to become your coach.”

 

My eyes are bugging and I can’t stop the incredulous grunt that comes out. Minako is still talking, voice increasingly high and hysterical but I can’t hear her.

Facing away from me, all I can see of him is the gentle lilt of his shoulder and drying hair plastered to the back of his neck. And he wants to be my coach?

 

Suddenly sneezing, Minako and I both start violently. But he just sits up sleepily, holding Makkachin to his chest.

 

He hums and looks over one shoulder at us, the damn robe slides off the other.

 

“Is there more food around here? I’m still hungry.” Now I know how lazy and low his voice is after he’s woken up so that’s useful. Twisting more fully to face me, I almost don’t catch what he says after I hear my own name. Food, he wants to know my favourite food.

 

“Oh, my fa- well I guess katsudon, it’s this like- hey, I’ll get you some,” I splutter inelegantly and scramble up, pretending not to see Minako’s raised eyebrow.

 

The katsudon goes down well, with delighted exclaims of “Vkusno!” between mouthfuls. Replete and brushing stray rice from his face, he casually inquires after his room.

 

 _His room_. “You’re staying? With us?” I manage.

 

“Of course,” Viktor glances up at me and must see something in my face because his eyes widen a little. “If it’s no trouble.”

 

“No no, not at all. I just didn’t expect- I’ll help you move your stuff.”

 

Assured, he swings past me- his breeze carrying a note of cologne, expensive smelling- and indicates several staggeringly tall piles of boxes. He pats one fondly and misinterprets the look on my face-

“Don’t worry, they can all go in my room. Out of the way.”

 

Right. Maybe they’ll be lighter than they look I think hopefully.

 

I have no idea what he felt was essential for his trip to Japan but my arms are trembling and I’ve just dropped a second box on my toe.

 

He’s looking around the room cheerfully as I stagger in with the last box and feel a hint of embarrassment. An Olympic gold medalist and he’s being shunted into the only tiny spare room available.

 

“What an incredibly adorable little room.” And his smile is so wide it must be genuine. I only find myself apologising from my crouch on the floor, still breathless.

 

Lined with red from box corners, my fingers throb and I’m certain I trapped a least one. I managed not to drop any potentially irreplaceable valuables though.

 

I’m still counting the small victories when he drops to one knee beside me with a low “Now then-“ and firm fingers come up beneath my chin, angle it closer.

 

“I want to know everything about you Yuri. Like what kind of rink you skate at and what hobbies do you have.” These are perfectly reasonable things for a coach to know about his student but he’s so close now that my skin is crawling and I’m overheating.

 

“And if there is a girl you like. Let’s get to know each other.” Fingers drift along my wrist like they’re caught in a breeze until he deftly catches them under my palm, pulls our hands flush. They feel dry and heated, with a pulse which could be mine or his.

 

“A relationship like this should be built on trust don’t you think?” Voice a creeping warmth. He still smells of the sweet perfumed spring water with something distinctly masculine beneath it that I’d caught a bare flash of earlier.

 

It’s a disarming look, him watching me from under his lashes. Recklessly warm eyes.

 

I wrench myself back with suddenness and something that decidedly is not a squeal. He blinks bemusedly.

 

“What’s wrong? Why did you run away?” He looks confused, maybe a little offended.

 

“Uh- I had a leg cramp,” I burst when the first flicker of intelligence reappears in my brain. Was that how they coached in Russia?

 

My heart was thumping so hard I must be vibrating with it. I needed to keep my cool, maybe Russians are especially tactile- with little understanding of personal space. He was going to kill me.

 

-

 

He comes to my room that night, wanting a sleepover. Or more precisely, to “sleep together” and I barely fend him off with rapid excuses as I whip around my room, tearing poster after poster from the walls. I was pathetic, so pathetic. My dreams were reifying before me and I was running.

 

As his footsteps fade accompanied by the click of Makkachin’s nails, I sink to the floor, swimming in pity and feeling wholly undeserving.

 


	4. Beautiful shapes

A warm squirming weight settles on my chest and, half-roused, I try to push Vicchan off.

 

“Wakey wakey, training starts today.”

 

I jerk violently up and Makkachin startles, catching me in the face with his foot as he leaps down. Vicchan’s gone- I’d forgotten for a moment. Viktor is there instead, face coming into focus as he bends to touch two fingers to where Makkachin’s nails had grazed my jaw.

 

He pulls back, taking his clarity with him, and I blearily reach for my glasses on the nightstand. He’s kitted up in a black hoodie and sweat pants with a rucksack already done up across his chest.

 

“Wha- where you goin’?” My voice sounds tacky with sleep and I roll my wrist to check my watch. Ugh why so early?

 

“We are going to the rink. Early morning jog there I think, get changed and meet me out the front.”

 

“Wait, Viktor!” I call as he disappears out the door but only Makkachin sticks his head back in.

 

“What... what about breakfast?”

 

-

 

At my peak I’d run daily. Every evening if I could. The stunning scenery of Hasetsu looping through even my dreams. Apparently you lose all your stamina you build up over years- in just a few months.

 

Viktor cycles ahead on a garishly yellow bike, cheerfully ringing his bell and calling out a greeting to the fisherman we pass on the bridge. Makkachin lopes along beside him, occasionally dropping back to join me or attempting to eat the half melted piles of snow still lining the streets. 

 

The fisherman looks vaguely alarmed when I pass, simultaneously heaving great gulps of air and trying to calm my breathing to alleviate the stitch in my side.

 

Running on legs role playing as unset jelly is a feat but I don’t stop. Viktor doesn’t look back and something about that gives me a fire to run with.

 

The steps up to Ice Castle are brutal but at least provide a handrail to haul myself up with. He’s stood at the top waiting, somehow having managed to haul his bike up the steps even though I’m almost certain there’s a stand to leave bikes at the bottom.

 

Telling Makkachin to stay, he strolls through the doors and I wobble in behind him. There’s the cool metal of a vending machine that I collapse against, still sweating, still panting.

 

“Hello, I’ll be Yuri’s coach from now on,” He waves pleasantly at the Nishigoris who gape back. “Viktor Nikiforov, nice to meet you.” He’s probably winking right now if I could drag my head up to see.

 

There’s a chorus of disbelieving huhs that I try not to take offence at.

 

“I’ll go get my skates on then,” he declares, striding away, quite unperturbed with the gormless staring. The eyes fall on me and I scuttle after Viktor before the questions begin.

 

After depositing our bags in a locker, I wind my familiar way to the rink, hearing the rake of metal against it before I even see it.

 

There’s a shadow flitting about the ice, but of course it’s Viktor. Long slender arms visible beneath a loose dark t-shirt, curving delicately. 

 

“Wow, a quadruple flip.” Yuuko whispers beside me. Stammi Vicino is filling the stadium and I’m reminded of his performance in the Grand Prix final. There’s less intensity now, he just stretching out, warming up. A flirt rather than a love making.

 

Takeshi comes to stand beside me and there’s a bizarre fatherliness about him that’s unsettling given he’s only a few years older.

 

“So this is for real.” And I can only nod in reply.

 

“He says he’d like to use this as our primary training rink for now, is that okay?” I have the sudden and devastating feeling that he’ll say no, that I’ll lose the security of Ice Castle but he just laughs and claps me on the shoulder.

 

Viktor circles closer and I never noticed how his skin looks against the backdrop of the ice; ethereal.

 

“Remember, you’re not setting foot in this rink until you drop some weight, little piggy.” He calls out merrily.

 

I’ve melted into the ice and his skates are cutting neatly across me; carving beautiful shapes into my body.

 


	5. Reciprocity

Minako’s ballet studio is a haven after all he’d put me through today. Apparently the jog home hadn’t been long enough and we’d taken a detour.

I’d eventually wrangled a deal in which I get a session to exercise as I choose each evening. Which of course meant Minako.

 

“Maybe he was just looking for an excuse to take a break.” Minako remarks, brutally honest as ever.

 

I wheeze and make a face.

“Come on don’t say that. It’s what I think too but I don’t like hearing it.”

 

“Listen, you wanna keep skating, don’t you. Let’s take advantage of this and trim off some fat.” She finishes on an encouraging little spin.

 

She works me late into the night, until my body burns with muscles it forgot it had. But it feels good. There’s this energy in me that had smouldered down after my Grand Prix screw up.

 

I go to bed that night and sleep deeply and easily in a way I haven’t in a long time. And the next night and the next. Viktor’s training schedule is relentless: every morning up early on a run, or in the gym or cycling.

 

It isn’t just fitness though. He asks questions, inquires about my childhood, genuinely seems to want to know me. It’s disarming and I’ll usually just flail and try to string together a sentence that might sound vaguely sensical.

 

One time, we’re in a little segment of the park, overlooking the water. The ground is foaming pink with fallen cherry blossom that Makkachin keeps trying to eat and Viktor is sat on the bench below me. He has me doing single leg squats with a swing and jump incorporated, they burn my thighs and sweat is tracing my hairline.

 

He’s been quieter this morning, gentle prodding questions rather than the unusual onslaught. Pensive even.

“So do you have feelings for Minako?” He asks and it’s sudden enough to knock my off my stride.

 

“No! No way!” I blurt because when you’ve known someone as long as I’ve known Minako they become deeply embedded in your family. Definitely no romantic intentions there.

 

Undeterred, he ploughs on, “Do you have a lover now?”

 

Heat is flooding my cheeks and I squirm out a negative. Why is this relevant? How is my lack of sexual prowess of any interest to him?

 

“What about ex-lovers?” He’s leant forward in interest now, eyes bright but not mocking.

 

I’m sweating and it isn’t from exertion. “I’d rather not talk about it.”

 

“Then let’s talk about my first lover,” he bursts “let’s see my first lover was-“

 

I shriek at him to stop because honestly hearing about some beautiful woman seducing him would crack me in two.

 

His face does something sharp before he just sighs in defeat, pulling back and resting his chin in his hands. He looks exhausted- in a different way to how I feel after our exercise sessions.

 

Makkachin barks and Viktor briefly becomes distracted with the ninja house but I can’t shake that look in his face. Was I really pushing him away?

 

It lingers with me as I lay in bed. The hurt twitch of his mouth. How his eyes had dulled and taken on a tired resigned look.

 

Viktor Nikiforov was here, trying to coach me, an actual dream incarnate.

 

I sit up, fill my lungs and stride out my room and down the corridor with purpose. The floor is cool beneath my bare feet and I half consider going back for slippers.

And then I’m there. Outside his door. Knocking rapidly and shifting nervously until I hear a muffled grunt from within. “Da?”

 

He’s half risen on his elbows when I creak open the door; silver hair sleep-strewn.

 

“I’m sorry, were you asleep?” I’m still loitering in the doorway uncertainly but he just smiles tiredly.

 

“A little, but don’t worry. How can I help you Yuri?” He shifts more upright and beside him Makkachin glances up.

 

“I uh- well I just thought that as my coach you should know as much about me as possible.”

 

He makes a surprised face but rubs his eyes and switches on the lamp beside him, making a gesture for me to join him on the bed.

 

Tucking a pillow behind my back, I sit at the end of his bed, facing him. I cross my legs under me carefully, conscious of his feet. Makkachin rises to nose closer to me and settles with his muzzle resting on my knee and a contented sigh.

 

“I realise I’ve been a little distant,” I start “but it’s hard in a way you can’t understand. You’re this infamous skater, this legend that I’ve idolised for years and now you’re here.” I’m looking at my knuckles, skimming a thumb over the raised skin of a scrape where I’d fallen.

 

“But I think I just need to forget that. Think about how dorky you are with Makkachin and ninjas.” He makes a disgruntled noise but I plough on.

 

“So ask me anything. All the questions I wouldn’t answer.” I chance a glance up but he just looks thoughtful. Scrapes a palm over his jaw.

 

“Okay, who’s Vicchan?”

 

“He’s- well he was my dog. But he died, just before the Grand Prix finals. He was a poodle too.” I say, fingers caught in Makkachin’s curls.

 

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, I just wish I’d be here.”

“What about skating. How did you start?”

 

“Minako actually. She’d been my ballet instructor for years and thought I’d enjoy it. Little did she know.” He smiles at that, a pleasant little upturn of the lips.

“That’s how I met Yuuko and Takeshi, they were in the same beginner course.”

 

“Did you ever have feelings for Yuuko, before she married of course.”

 

“I always thought she was pretty but we were so friendly when we were younger it never really touched on that. Maybe a little when I’d come back, between seasons, and she’d let me skate at the rink.”

 

“Hm, what about other lovers? You wouldn’t talk about them today.” He asks tentatively, looks a little like he’s expecting me to rebuff him again.

 

“Well there’s only two, and uh they aren’t even ‘lovers’ really. I certainly didn’t love them.” I can feel the onset of a blush so I quell my nerves, straighten up a little.

 

“Tell me. The first?”

 

“There was a girl at the rink. She was nice and she kept getting me to help her practise and I didn’t think much of it because I _was_ better. And um one time in the locker room, when it was just us she, well she kissed me. Which I hadn’t done before. It was nice and I was young so obviously you know- I liked it.”

 

Viktor is watching me calmly which quietens something in my gut.

 

“I didn’t have a crush on her but it was nice being wanted and she’d do stuff when it was just us, like she blew me in the showers. And one time I was just sat there and she got in my lap and um... well yeah. So she was my first.”

 

Viktor hums. “And the second.”

 

“Oh well, a skater actually. It was just a small competition when I was still just working on my skating. I’d only just met Celestino in fact. And this guy comes up to me afterward and says how good my step work is-“

 

“You do have lovely step work.”

 

“Oh- thank you. Uh so he says that and then invites me out with a group of skaters. So I go with them and after a while I realise he’s- he wants to uh-“

 

“He’s attracted to you. Interested.”

 

“Yeah, interested. And he’s a good looking guy. Also there aren’t really- I’d never really had a chance with a guy... here. My parents would be fine but-“

 

Viktor nods with this sad twisted smile and I suddenly think about Russia. Is it even legal there?

 

“So he was my second. We were both staying the week so hooked up a few times. And I’ve met people on nights out that I spent the night with. No ‘lovers’ though.”

 

I feel raw and wrung out. Like I’ve just pulled a blade out from between my ribs.

 

“But have you never wanted someone Yuri? Pursued them. More than just for immediate gratification.”

He’s pulled his knees up closer to his chest and I feel like there’s a mountain of duvet between us. I want to say _you_ , I’ve wanted you for so long I can’t even tell if I want to be you or to have you.

 

“I guess not.”

 

“But even your previous partners. These people chase you and you just let them catch you.” He sounds fervent. Eyes locked on mine, lashes twitching with the urge to blink.

 

“It’s not like I can’t lust.” I say and it comes out a little indignant, a little petulant. He chuckles like I don’t understand.

 

“I know that. Thank you Yuri, for spilling yourself.” Maybe his translation got a little snagged there but essentially I have. I’ve spilled my life to him. Said things in a way I’m not sure I ever have, outside my head.

 

“You should sleep. We’ll be up early tomorrow.” He says and I gently nudge Makkachin’s head from my knee as I stand. I got a hand pulling his door closed again when he calls out my name.

 

“Thank you.” And he smiles. Nestles deeper into his pillow.

 

-


	6. Ignition

Over the next few weeks, the weight melts off me. My appearance finally beginning to match my increased fitness and stamina.

 

I find myself having to dig deep through my drawers to find the clothes from last year that had ceased to fit. It feels good wearing jeans instead of sweatpants and I even dare to bare myself bathing in the hot spring.

 

The day I finally step onto the scales and see I’m at the weight I was before the final, I beam. Leap through the Inn, past my mother carrying a tray of tea. Race my way up the steps to Ice Castle. It’s packed with people, as it’s been everyday since Viktor inadvertently confirmed the rumours of his coaching. Yet I glide between them, barely sweating despite the stairs.

 

The triplets are doing an impressive job of holding back the masses despite their small statues. I almost trip on a leopard print suitcase but am so desperate to get onto the ice I hardly notice; already riding the buzz.

 

I’m wrenching open the doors, raring to get my skates on when a foot hits me squarely in the back. Enough force behind it to knock me forward and I barely catch myself on my elbows. The beginnings of rug burn heats my forearms as I squirm around to see my assailant.

 

I have a split second to register the furious face striding closer, connect it to the Yuri Plisetsky who’d screamed at me after the Grand Prix final, before a foot comes down beside my head. Hard enough to rattle the floor.

 

“All of this is your stupid fault, now say you’re sorry!” He growls, eyes dark. Terrifying.

 

I squeak out a baffled apology, increasingly concerned with the proximity of his foot to my face.

 

Eventually he steps back with a scowl, looking slightly less murderous.

“A long time ago Viktor promised he’d choreograph a program for me. He promise you too?” The fire has quelled now and he just looks gruff and intimidating.

 

“Uh- we haven’t exactly gotten around to talking about programs.” I stand quickly before he can change his mind about stamping on my head.

 

What Yuri Pliesetsky lacks in size and age, he certainly makes up for in sheer aggression, evidenced in his next outburst. There’s more foot stomping and he stalks dangerously close, glowering up.

 

“He’s wasting a year! And for a cry baby who sobs in the bathroom. What a waste.” His voice curls with the taunt and I bristle at his sneer. Viktor chose _me_ to coach and Yuri’s being a salty baby about being forgotten. I find myself smirking down at him, riding back on my heels to my full height.

 

“Wipe that smirk off your face.” He threatens and I’ve definitely reignited him.

 

“I’m not sure what Viktor promised you, go talk to him yourself. It’s not like I made Viktor come to Hasetsu, he came because he wanted to be my coach.” I turn casually and lead him out to the rink, catching a deeply satisfying flash of Yuri’s reddening face.

 

Viktor is skating; entirely absorbed in his movements. It’s a routine I don’t recognise but he carries the same balletic poise as ever.

 

“I recognise those moves.” Yuri whispers beside me and he sounds near awestruck. “They’re for the short program Viktor was choreographing for next season.”

 

He comes to lean against the rink boards beside me, hood up and characteristic hair flopping across the side of his face.

 

“Before he decided to come here, he was putting together routines for next season. He was really torn though. The audience aren’t surprised any more and it eats at him.” Yuri looks softer, the perpetual scowl relaxing to reveal large angled eyes. Almost childlike.

 

“He doesn’t feel inspired and without inspiration you’re as good as dead.”

 

Viktor is spinning tightly, silver flashing across his face. Arms embracing himself.

 

“I know I can win the Grand Prix, but I need his help.” The determined edge knifes into his voice suddenly enough that I glance away from Viktor to watch Yuri hurl himself forward to holler.

 

-

 

I actually feel physically sick. I finally get the courage to open up to Viktor, give him a chance to know me as my coach and it’s going to be ripped away. I’d seen Yuri Pliesetsky skate and it is unlike anything I’d ever seen. He channels fire into grace. I barely stay on my feet.

 

He’s pacing around the Inn impatiently because of course he’s staying here also. Brash and dismissive and arrogant but so assured. He knows he’ll win.

 

He isn’t nervous and blubbering just talking to Viktor. There’s potential and it shines out of him like a beacon. _How could Viktor not be drawn to him?_

 

Maybe this is for the best and it’ll save Viktor the embarrassment later.

 

I slip out quietly and settle into a jog to Ice Castle, the night breeze calming me. The stars are bashful tonight, letting a veil of cloud hide them. The moon is bright though, boldly painting itself along the water, ripples shattering the clean lines.

 

I skate and I skate until my breaths are solid again and my heart refills. There’s a bizarre clarity that comes when skating without glasses- the ice becoming this expansive wild thing without edges. And I can skate and feel like any moment I’ll tumble off the edge of the world.

 

 

 

 


	7. Fumbling with the matches

“First, ‘On love: Agape.’”

It’s a bright and beautiful skate. Viktor’s body arching and curling around the music. Bleeding with the pellucidity of a child’s voice.

 

Yurio looks uncertain for once. Thumbing over his mouth.

 

It’s a tough routine, especially for a senior debut. It _could_ be beautiful. But he’s so brash and unforgiving.

 

Viktor finishes before the music; shrugging off the haze of the routine as he turns to us, immediately perky and unpredictable again.

 

“Something like that. Thoughts?”

 

“Yeah, whatever.” Yurio grunts.

 

And then it’s me. Eros. Except that I could never be the lithe sensual creature cresting the ice, hips jagged, arms a temptation.

 

Rippling like a mirage. Skates slashing through a barrage of footwork. It’s fast paced and breathless. Oozing with lust and sticky with want.

 

My heart is hammering and I’ve never known heat like this, never seen it so brusquely paraded. Like a lover dropping their robes in front of me; revelling in skin, skin, skin.

 

Then he’s calling me onto the ice, asking my thoughts with one hand on his cocked hip like he’s still riding the energy of the routine. Still brimming with it.

 

“Well, it’s uh- it was very ‘eros’.” I manage and my voice is clear. For once.

 

He smiles because his sensuality is unquestionable, it’s as present as any of his physical features. Without it would be like him without eyes.

 

Very suddenly he’s touching my face- again. Thumb coming up to press into my bottom lip, just enough to test, enough that I don’t breathe. He’s so close our noses could touch and he’s still carrying the heat of skating on his skin. White and curling, he watches me beneath his lashes and there’s the barest hint of freckles that might emerge come summertime, just down the bridge of his nose.

 

Unleash my Eros. Apparently it’s within me. And he sees it.

 

I could never dream of entertaining the beguiling monster he introduced on the ice. I’d be eaten alive. My bones spat back out.

 

“You said that you can lust. Show me in this routine. Can you do that?” His voice is distractingly low and catching. Enough that I could-

 

“Hey! Stop chatting with the Piggy!” Yurio hollers across, fist shaking until Viktor pulls back. I unfurl my sticky palms and am suddenly grateful that I chose to wear oversized sweat pants. How does he do it?

 

 

-

 

It quickly becomes evident that neither Yurio nor I, had any real grasp on our subjects. Viktor would just stand there, furrowed brow, saying “again.” with a dismissive sweep of his hand.

 

It wasn’t like I wasn’t trying. I’d desperately conjure up images of any sexual encounters, wade through them for any semblance of raw unadulterated lust. The more I thought on them, the blander they seemed.Mostly I’d been drunk and content to fall into bed with the first person to approach me. It hadn’t been a matter of lusting after them.

Even with Krisha, as teenagers at the rink, it hadn’t piqued any real interest.

 

It was like skating blindfolded. Yurio couldn’t put out the fire and I was fumbling with the matches to light it.

 

I was still throwing myself into the workouts, pushing until my legs trembled and Takeshi would have to suggest a break. Didn’t stop until my shirt was dark with sweat.

The muscle returned, gradually changing my shape until one morning when I first noticed my shirt straining over my chest.

 

And yet Eros remained illusive. I tried skating the routine as Viktor had done, bright and impulsive, and there was a spark of something but I still didn’t catch alight.

 

I skate and skate until I’m numb and distracted. 23 years old and I can’t embody lust. Can barely imagine it, let alone exude it.

 

It’s just Viktor there, watching quietly until my mistakes get sloppy enough that I remove myself from the ice. I can’t look at him as I pass. And in the rink showers I just glare at the wall, water almost too hot and sluicing down my spine.

 

Gurgling into life, the shower beside me starts and Viktor is there, ducking his head below the spray. Typically he prefers bathing in the hot springs over showering but here he is. Hair darkening with water. I carefully don’t look down.

 

“Yuri. You know you don’t need to find the Eros, you already have it.”

I watch as droplets trip over his closed lashes, kick up when they reaches his lips.

 

“Then why can’t I see it.” I grumble, allowing the water to blur the words, stick them together so maybe he won’t hear.

 

He steps out the spray and pushes his dripping hair back from his eyes. Blinks the water from his lashes.

I hear his feet unstick from the wet tiles before I see him move.

 

“I see it.” His palm fits over my chest, over my heart.

“I see it in you.” The other hand finds my hair, slicks it back.

“You’re looking too hard when it’s right here.“

 

I just gape at him and register something akin to lust working it’s way into me. My heart is definitely kicking up. Is this Eros? Wanting his fingertips to meld to me. Tasting his breath. The spiked clumps of wet lashes. Heated eyes, blue like a gas flame. The showers have turned themselves off and there is just a steady drip on the tiles.

 

He licks his lips as he steps back and a feeling so poignant it can only be disappointment, jerks through me. A slow swallow and I note the pink in the tip of his nose.

 

“You already have it, just learn how to bring it onto the ice.” And he turns to wander out; the pale backs of his knees and wet shine of his thighs.

I watch the shadow beneath his buttocks and the shift of muscle until it disappears around the corner.

 

Restarting the shower and washing away the chill drying on my skin, I think about his words. And then I think about his ass as he walked away. It feels dirty jerking off in a public shower so I switch the water to cold and brace myself.

 


	8. The seducer and the seduced

 

It’s tomorrow. Hot Springs on ice. Whether I win or lose. Whether Viktor stays or goes.

Long past closing, Yuuko and Takeshi having gone home with the triplets, and I’m still skating.

 

Because something is still missing. I’d found Eros in the pork cutlet bowl and I envisage it as I move; how Viktor had shovelled it into his mouth delightedly and his tongue had lapped into the corner of his lips when he’d finished. But it isn’t enough. I’m no playboy sweeping up lovers and tossing them aside.

 

I run back through the routine, try to centre myself again by practicing the quadruple salchow Yurio had showed me. I land it- barely. It isn’t enough.

 

No one will believe that lovers traipse after me, lap up my affections, that I pursue one and her resolve buckles, that she falls for me. It won’t show in my skating. Honestly I’m a better fit for the woman being chased, now _that’s_ something I could-

 

The woman. I’m the woman.

 

I scramble off the ice and check my phone. Nearly midnight, I’ve got time.

 

Minako answers her door with a grunt. Looks me over darkly. Her hair is half strung back into a bun and the rest hangs around her face.

 

“Please tell me you know what fucking time it is. You really want to practise now?”

 

“I’m sorry it’s so late, but I need your help with this. Tonight.”

 

After a brief stare down as she tries to ascertain whether I’ve seriously woken her up at midnight to practise, she rolls her eyes and steps aside. Muttering fractiously.

 

She shuts the door when I’m inside and turns with her arms crossed, eyebrow raised in a _so_?

 

“I want you to teach me how to move like a woman.” I blurt. And yeah in retrospect I could’ve worded that better, eased her into the idea.

 

She just stares and I scrabble to explain. She knows as well as anyone that I’m not the playboy, but being the beautiful woman who _seduces_ the playboy- maybe.

 

“It’s a risk Yuri. Especially so last minute.”

“I know but it’ll work, I feel it. You have to teach me though.”

 

Blowing a puff of air out her lips, determination overtakes the look of contemplation. She clears her living room and has me step through the routine as best I can off-ice.

 

“Okay your mind is in the right place, you’ve just got to follow through with your body. Move like you know you’re wanted, like you’re trying to seduce him.”

 

I run through again, trying to lengthen my legs, roll my hips.

 

“Yes! Bring out those sexy eyes!”

 

I need Viktor to choose me. To see that I’m who he’s meant to coach. Yurio is a child, he could never have done this routine.

 

“Wait wait, run through from the start but just pause- yes right there.Just give a look. Make Viktor chose you, give him no choice.”

 

I flash my eyes and crook a wicked smile. Minako beams.

 

-

 

It’s a haze. The music, the crowds, the lights. But I remember Viktor’s embrace. Thinking that he’d worn cologne today, as I begin the skate.

 

I am the woman and my body is a weapon. I wield it recklessly, with intent. Arch myself back slowly, let my legs swing a little wide and my eyes flutter.

Make them imagine it.

Curl, just so the fabric pulls dangerously. A tease. I throw back my head and know the light follows the hollows of my throat. Let them chase me.

 

Viktor is watching. I want him to see me like this. Want him to know that lust sparks in my fingertips; drives others inside out with my touch. I want to own his dreams and make him wake- aching for me. I want to rule his thoughts when he swears and whimpers.

 

I finish in the centre, arms throw around myself, toe poised against the ice and the shift from music to cheer is almost indiscernible. I’m shuddering and sweating and heaving for breath. But I did it.

 

“Yuri!” Viktor cries. And I move towards his call on numb legs until he folds me in his arms. I could collapse.

 

“I don’t think I have ever seen a tastier pork cutlet bowl!” And I want to laugh because it occurs to me that I didn’t think about katsudon once the entire skate.

 

“But really, what was that triple axel out of the spread eagle? It was your worst attempt so far! And you get Yurio to secretly-“ he’s talking rapid fire and I zone out staring at his mouth move, exhaustion blowing through me without the adrenaline hit. A lecture, really?

 

But it’s him who grips my shoulder and leads me out to the podium. Keeps me steady with a firm hand around my bicep, squeezing in support as I’m handed the microphone. Morooka beams up at me.

 

I breathe, look at the ripple of faces. “Well uh- I’m going to try and win the next Grand Prix final- with Viktor. Thank you for your continued support.”

 

Cheers start again and I give a vague wave but my legs are wavering under me. An indescribably heavy weight is solidifying in my chest and I’m certain my knees will buckle under the strain.

Viktor starts guiding me down and away from the crowd, arm just tightening when I have to lean more heavily against him.

 

I feel leaden and woozy. Exhaustion having torn through me like a hurricane, leaving the shredded buildings and rubble behind.

 

We manage to bypass most of my family and then it’s just the cool dark familiar of my room.

 

“You’ll be exhausted, sleep Yuri.” And he must deposit me on my bed but I’m already half-asleep, vaguely registering cool cotton and a comforting scent as sheets are pulled over me.

 

“I’m proud, Katsudon.” And the door clicks shut


	9. A foreign concept

Viktor skates beside me, loosely mirroring my moves but mostly just watching. I catch a satisfied nod after a brief section of footwork but that’s easy, ingrained into my body by now. My feet slicing familiarly into the ice as my head delves elsewhere.

Without Yurio, it has really hit me that everything I do is for Viktor. He’s weighing his entire life on me and I might buckle.

 

I fear that I’m not good enough or that he secretly wishes to return to skating competitively.

I fear and I can’t stop.

 

My palms suddenly smack against the ice and I realise I’ve flubbed a jump and fallen. That I’d barely stopped my skull from colliding with the ice. Damp is bearing into my knees and I struggle up.

 

“You’re distracted.” He says as I pass but I ignore him and reset in the centre.

My skin stings and my right wrist is smarting dangerously. I go again.

When I fall this time, it’s my knee that cracks against the ice and I cry out as pain ricochets up my leg.

 

He’s beside me in an instant but I’ve already pulled myself up and am skating around him, back to the centre.

 

“Yuri, this is enough.” And a stern edge is embedded in his voice, reminiscent of the snippets I’d heard of Yakov.

But I’m tired and sore so it’s hard to put up a fight. I follow him to the edge, shame dragging behind me like a cloak.

 

“Are you going to tell me what is bothering you?”

 

I bend to sweep the ice from the side of my blades; all I can see are his knees. One skate is tapping against the ice, waiting.

“Hmmm, perhaps we should switch it up. Play me your free program music and we’ll talk through some choreography.”

 

An anxious bud starts to unfurl behind my ribs but it’s thorns snag on my diaphragm and as it blooms it squeezes my lungs. I still haven’t chosen, _can’t_ chose.

 

He must read my face because his eyebrows raise in surprise. “You _still_ haven’t chosen the music?”

 

“I tried- I just...”

 

“Trust your intuition. Find something that inspires you.” And there he goes with the whole ‘inspiration’ thing as though it’s as easy as that. Because he, of course, has faith that he won’t fuck up his jumps or crumble into a sooty mound of fear as soon as he gets to a competition.

 

“It could even be a memory, like when a girl said she loved you.”

 

I couldn’t hold back the hissing and spitting anger folded into my “What!” even if I wanted. It shoots from me like a missile, flaming and intent on never returning. And yet after it’s whistled past, hot and bright, it leaves me staring into the wide eyes of Viktor and shocked slack mouth. It’s a look of surprise but it’s toppling over the wall into hurt.

 

Then the apologies are tearing from my mouth and my cloak of shame has concrete sewn into the hems, weighting down my shoulders.

 

“No it’s my fault.” Viktor says, eternally patient and forgiving, beyond what I deserve. “I forgot you never had a lover.”

 

Right, of course. Good old Yuri Katsuki who’s never had a lover. Doesn’t know lust. Can’t choose a piece of music.

I turn away and skate back to the centre.

 

 

-

 

Despite barely seeing him outside of practise (my own doing), he’d begun to invade my dreams instead. Mostly they were just memories. Sometimes a specific segment of a routine, or him cycling beside me as I jogged- mundane things.

 

Tonight it’s the hot spring. I ache from practise and the water is blissfully soothing.

He hovers over me, outline vague under the haze of steam.

 

The dream sky is sinking through sunset, into darkness, impossibly fast, but the fading light looks good on his skin.

Smooth and firm, condensation beading.

When he speaks his accent seems heavier, the Russian lilt more pronounced in the tight heat.

 

Gripping my wrists, suddenly and firmly, he half pulls me from the water; coolness sticking to my wet chest and the heat of the bath still slopping around my legs. I can’t do much more than gaze up at him.

Blue in a halo of silver. Fervent.

 

He drags me completely up, my wrists still slack and shackled. I think I’d felt exposed at the time, but now there just warmth.

 

My leg is lifted and coaxed into a stretch. I don’t fight, let his fingers flex. There’s nobody there now, nobody to watch his hand slip down my calf.

 

Uncertainty seems a foreign concept and I press back against him with confidence. Know I’ll find him warm and pressing. Undeniably so.

 

Palm slow, it pauses at my inner thigh, tugging at the light hair there teasingly. It’s partner plays along my throat; fingers flirting over the crests and divots. 

 

The steam has become so dense it’s like the clouds have fallen around us. The rest of the world could drop away and I’d still be happy with just the hot body moulded against my back and the hands on my chest. The low drag of Russian in my ear and tickling silver hair on my neck.

 

The crawl back to consciousness is so slow that I barely notice, until I roll over to emptiness and feel a strange twist in my gut independent of the ache between my legs.

 

I hadn’t had a dream like that since I was 17 and Viktor had done a skate that had left me breathless. Yet it feels different this time, now that he isn’t just a stranger. Now that I know his favourite food, and bedtime routine and shampoo brand. He’s realer than the fantasy of him in my head had been; he has quirks and flaws.

 

I look down at the tent in my boxers. Contemplative. It’s persistent, that’s for sure, determined to be an issue.

 

I think decidedly about innominate men, women, as I jerk off. Imagine the shape of their bodies, the flush of skin, the feel of fingers and mouths. It’s enough- until it isn’t and I need flashing blue eyes and the phantom brush of silver hair on my skin to push me over. Still choking on a groan, I glance down at my stomach, my fist, and the guilt splashed over them.


	10. Fragile moments

It’s late when we return from the beach. The steam room has long cooled but I still sit on the edge of one bath, washing the sand from between my toes. Rough against my blistered feet, the grains collect in swirls as they gravitate towards the drain; dark spirals.

 

Bruises like smudged ink on my skin, my toes swollen and stiff. They resist movement when I rub them gently and one nail is purpled with bruising.

 

Footsteps pad into the room and I know it’s Viktor before he settles beside me, swinging his feet in next to mine. They’re narrow with long slender toes- like a dancer’s.

In his hiatus from competitive skating his feet have mostly healed but I can still see the evidence of his career in the crooked toes, too many times broken with too little recovery.

 

“Oh your feet Yuri, we’ll get some thicker padding for your skates. Perhaps for the next few days we’ll work off ice-“ He muses, bumping his foot against mine.

 

I brush some sand off the back of his neck when his hair falls forward to expose it, as he washes his feet. He twists his head slightly to look at me through his bangs.

“Sand.” I explain, enjoying the soft of his skin, the start of silver hair up his neck into his scalp.

 

My hand drops back to my lap and I watch as his skin washes clean, mud and grains swept away until it’s only the faint tan lines of his ankles marring his skin. A fine gold anklet resting on his left.

 

“Does it bother you?” He asks, quietly enough that I have to run it through it my head after, check that I got every word.

 

“Does what?”

 

“What I said earlier- about what I am to you.”

 

“Wha- my lover?”

 

A hum of agreement. His head is dipped low and if I’d never met him before I’d say he was uncertain.

 

“No. I meant what I said though, I don’t want you to change yourself for me.” I take a breath, feel out this fragile moment we’ve carved-

“But sometimes, I’ve skated and it’s like I wanted you to... like I was trying to-“

_Seduce you._

“I wanted you to choose me. Desperately. I wanted you to see me and feel- I don’t know but I needed it.”

 

The white tiles look artificial and too bright now, spotting my vision as I stare. Viktor shifts in my peripheral like he’s trying to catch my eye.

 

“I did choose you Yuri. I would do it again.” His voice is different, lacks the usual vigour and musicality. Stripped.

“You skate like you are dancing with the ice, anyone can imagine them self in your arms. Imagine being your lover.”

 

“Even you?”

“Especially me.”

 

I gaze back at him, lose myself in the simmering blue- gas lamps burning low.

 

“Why do you look at me like that?” I ask, lips unlocking the question themselves.

 

“Like what?” It’s a breath. Barely audible.

 

“Like you’re trying to teach me lust. Like you’re holding Eros inside you.”

 

He chuckles, doesn’t push back the sweep of silver as it falls over one eye and leans just out of reach.

 

“You don’t need teaching Yuri. You and Eros are close friends.”

 

“You introduced us.”

 

“Perhaps I did.”

 

Then he leans in very suddenly but with the grace and care of a dove coming in to land. Planting his mouth against mine deliberately, just one push so I feel the melting of his lips, before he draws back.

 

He looks a little dazed like he’s not sure if he actually just did that. But it occurs to me that I didn’t get much of a chance to kiss him back and so I grip his chin and return it, mostly just catching his bottom lip but tugging on it anyway. This time I feel the wet inside of his lips, touch my tongue to it.

 

“You kissed me.” Viktor breathes after, a flush warming his skin.

 

“You kissed me first.”

 

A smile catches his mouth, just plucking at the corners.

I feel delirious and breathless and elated.

 

Sleep comes easily that night. Now that I know how sweet his breath is and how our mouths fit.

 

Nothing changes much except that he’ll hold my eye and smile during practise, like we’re sharing a secret. And he’ll walk me through a movement with touches to my arms rather than just demonstrating. Little things, but they are kindling on the steady blaze of my heart.

 

-

 

 

The regionals are a blur; the nerves cutting and melting scenes into one another until I can’t even remember how each skate went. Of course I know what I technically scored, but remembering how each jump went, whether my footwork was in time or even the tightness of my spins- gone.

 

I lay back on the hotel bed, nose still throbbing but warmth all through me. I’d won. Beaten the other competitors, beaten the anxiety. Made Viktor proud. It’s a giddy feeling that creeps a smile onto my face when I’m not looking.

 

There’s still blood crusted around my nostrils, and it flares, tender, when I sniff. That had been a fuck up for sure, ramming my head into the rink boards, but it hadn’t thrown me. I’d got back up. Carried on.

 

Viktor had been insistent that I get checked for a concussion when I’d come off the ice. Walked me to the medic himself, a firm unrelenting hand on my back, ignoring my assertions that I was entirely fine beyond some mild embarrassment.And I had been, minor bruising she’d said, with recommendations for an ice pack.

 

I breathe deeply now. Chest light and filled with air, perhaps enough to float me away.

 

The first buzz of my phone reaches me slowly and I have a bizarre momentary thought that workmen are drilling around my room. But the screen flashes bright and I peer over. Phichit.

I sit up properly and open his message. We’d kept in contact intermittently since I’d asked for help finding the free program girl, and it feels good to be rebuilding something.

 

‘ _Congrats today, Yuri!’_ It read, with several judiciously chosen emojis.

‘ _Looks like you and your new coach are getting cosy._ ’ Which baffles me until I spot the link. It takes me to a twitter account, @theicedinformant, that sparks a hazy recognition.

And then I suddenly remember the photos they’d posted of my series of falls at last years Grand Prix. Good quality, clear photographs that had captured my every devastating tumble. Immortalised the horror and pain on my face.

Theicedinformant is notorious in its ability to walk the fine line between being actually informative and a gossip rag. So it’s with apprehension that I look at the picture. The first thing I note is that I’m tagged, but I’ve been studiously avoiding all social media since last year and so it’s unsurprising I haven’t see it yet.

 

The next thing is the actual photo. It’s been taken from across the rink but the lens is zoomed in. I’m stood rigid, mouth open with something like shock, and Viktor is hugging me tightly from behind. It forces a memory to the forefront of my mind, plucks it from the whirr. 

 

Arms a vice around my chest. Hiding behind a screen of silver, his face tucked into my neck. And even just looking at it, I can recall the torridity of his breath and the strength of his hold. _Seduce me with all you have._

 

There’s 4 photos, all within seconds of each other, so viewers are afforded the gradual but marked deepening colour in my cheeks. Another picture freezes my leap into Viktor’s arms after my free skate, bloodstained face a vision of delight.

 

I see the number of comments and feel a genuine shudder. Because it’s one thing to doubt and question Viktor deciding to coach the Japanese flop who placed last in the Grand Prix, myself. To hear others echo that-

The warmth is gone and I feel empty, in a tight itchy way.

 

But the comments are kind; congratulating me on the solid skate, hopeful to see me progress, glad I returned to skating. A couple even wryly speculate on Viktor and I’s relationship.

 

They’d been brutal the last time my pictures had graced @theicedinformant’s timeline. And now they were sweet and docile again, tucking away the teeth.

 

The exhaustion hits me suddenly then. As it always does eventually, after a competition. The anxiety and skating and fear washing away anything like energy. Lapping at the empty edges of my chest, always wanting more.

 

So the skating community had accepted me back. And I’d won. And Viktor was proud.

Sleep takes me.

 

 


	11. Bright blur

It’s the light carding of fingertips through my hair that wakes me now. Soft- always careful not to tug. And after practise, a thumb will sweep the sweat from my forehead.

We’ll walk in sync and his leg becomes a reassuring presence against mine when we’re sat together, a warm press as if he feels compelled to touch.

On one occasion, after repeatedly missing a jump, he pulls me in close and presses a slow kiss to my brow.

 

It humbles me. To be the receiver of such tenderness-

and yet I yearn for more.

I want his mouth again. To further my exploration. Learn what stumbles his breath.

 

But we are never alone. So I curb my hunger with looks; warm and spilling out of me, soaking into the carpet. Always met with equal covet in his eyes, cast low with hunger.

 

Until outside my room he stops me with a hand flat against my stomach and captures my mouth. I get one hand in his silver hair, thread through it, grip it, angle him just right. Make his mouth drop, just to heave against my lips. It’s only brief given the guests and my family, always weaving through the corridors, but it sates me. He looks back at me as he walks away, all content and dopey in a way that squeezes.

 

I don’t know his body but I think I’m learning his heart.

 

-

 

 

Viktor leads me away from Yakov with a firm arm, feigning ignorance with only a slight giveaway flush along his jaw.

He’d wanted Yakov’s approval. Content to annoy and disobey him as a coach, there was still a deep respect there, a wish to please and make him proud. Even as a child, watching Viktor on screen, I could see the paternal pride Yakov carried, in a way he didn’t with his other skaters.

 

“Where do you suppose the nearest hot pot place is?” Viktor says with a cheeriness that makes me raise an eyebrow.

 

“He was probably just busy.” I suggest carefully but Viktor just shrugs and ploughs on about his quest to sample authentic Chinese hot pot.

 

Only once we’re seated in a booth and Viktor has an array of foods to dip in the hot pot broth between us, is he distracted from his slump. I let him babble away delightedly, keen to conserve his elevated mood.

 

A vague concern has been nagging me for days now, pitching forward into my thoughts before I can shutter it away again. It dances on the table before me, taunting.

In the briefest lull of quiet do I blurt it out.

 

“Did I say too much? At the press conference? I feel like I really ran my mouth. About you and the competition. I mean- what will people say if I lose now?”

 

“You won’t lose Yuri,” He manages between mouthfuls of shrimp “And even if you don’t win, you’re still an impressive skater and you’ve shown your skill. People are watching you.”

 

He’d prodded his chopsticks in my direction throughout, to enunciate his point. “Are you sure you don’t want any shrimp?”

 

“Uh yeah, I try to avoid raw food before a competition. Alcohol too,” I add as he takes another sip of his beer.

 

“Yuri?” And suddenly Phichit is peering down at me, blended delight and surprise. “I wondered when we’d bump into each other.”

There’s slight stubble along his jaw that definitely hadn’t been there when I’d last seen him but he’s got the same backwards cap on. Same bright eyes.

I stand to hug him and he’s real and present in a way the text messages had been unable to convey. There’s even a hint of cologne on him.

 

“It’s so good to see you! Oh I’ll invite Ciao Ciao, he hasn’t seen you in ages.”

 _That_ threads discomfort through me. All the disappointment and guilt rushing back, the failure and humiliation.

 

“He’s just coming now. It’s so cool I bumped into you guys, it’ll be just like old times- except with Viktor now of course.” Phichit sends me a sly look that I attempt to innocently return as we sit back down, with me beside Viktor now and him across.

 

“I’m intrigued,” Viktor leans forward, momentarily relinquishing his chopsticks in favour of a new distraction. “What was your experience with Yuri as a roommate?”

 

Phichit snorts, glee evident in his eyes.

“I forgot, you two are living together right? Have you heard him talk about katsudon in his sleep yet?”

 

“Okay!” I interrupt as Viktor jerks forward with excitement.

“Enough about me, how’s Thailand been since you moved back?”

 

Phichit smiles with a warning that he hasn’t finished on the subject but humours me and allows talk to sway onto him.

Viktor is still quizzing him on the Thai nationals when Celestino appears beside us with a booming jovial “Ciao Ciao!”

 

It quickly become evident, once we’re all seated and conversing, that Celestino is apprehensive about Viktor. As a coach. He voices as much.

 

“I’m surprised you’ve stayed so long is all, eh.”

 

“I take the role of Yuri’s coach extremely seriously. This wasn’t an experiment.” Viktor replies levelly.

 

“I guess I just don’t understand it. Why just up and leave a successful career eh?”

 

“Coaching is something new, Yuri has a lot of potential.”

 

“I know, that is why I’m worried.”

 

Phichit sends me an awkward look and adjusts his napkin helplessly.

“Why don’t I invite Leo to join us?”

 

“Excellent idea. Hey Viktor, let’s go get more drinks for everyone.” With a firm hold of his sleeve I lead him towards the bar.

Not exactly the relaxing evening I’d anticipated before my big competition. Already I’m churning with nervousness and wishing I was back in Hasetsu. Warm, comfortable Hasetsu.

 

“Hmm I need to win Celestino over.” Viktor muses. “We should have a drinking competition.”

 

And like that, my brief attempts at calm are obliterated.

“What the hell Viktor! No!”

 

“Why? I’m Russian, I will win. He will respect me.” Viktor flags down the bartender with a request for a bottle of baijiu.

 

“A bottle! Viktor this won’t-“

 

“Yuri you worry too much.” Viktor cups my face between his hands, ignorant of my horror. “Celestino was your old coach, he is important to you and so it’s important to me that I gain his respect.”

 

He takes the two glasses and bottle of clear liquid from the bar, motioning with his head for me to follow him back to the booth.

 

“Celestino! Can I interest you in a drink. Baijiu is strong stuff so don’t worry if it’s too much for you.”

 

It’s subtle but he’s wheedling, challenging Celestino, who raises an eyebrow back.

 

“Give me a glass boy.”

 

It descends into anarchy from there.

Perhaps Celestino overestimated his tolerance or maybe Viktor’s Russian ancestry came through for him, either way...

 

“I think- I will admit defeat. I am defeated. Great Italy has fallen to Russia.” Celestino slurs and very slowly, let’s his head loll forward onto the table. It looks like he’s lying in a spillage of beer from earlier.

 

“See Yuri, what did I say. It is Russia! We drink vodka for breakfast.”

 

“I certainly hope not.”

 

“God look at him,” Phichit is staring at Celestino with fascinated horror. He prods him with one finger. “He’s out, like a light. I can’t believe you got Celestino wasted, Yuri!”

 

“Hey! I did not, it was Viktor-“

 

“Yes darling?” And a warm arm is thrown over my shoulder with a notable lack of coordination. It slips off twice, eventually hanging on with fingers twisted in my collar.

 

“Is it hot in here Yuri? I’m very hot.”

 

“Well you’re a little drunk so that’s probably it, but I guess it is a little warm.”

 

Unwinding himself from me, I almost mourn the touch until I see what he’s doing.

 

“What- Viktor! You can’t take your shirt off, we’re in a restaurant.”

 

“But it’s so hot.” He whines, continuing to struggle to free his arms from their material confines. There’s the distinct sound of tearing stitches and then he emerges, disheveled hair and pink cheeks. Broad bare shoulders.

 

Phichit has unearthed his phone and is tilting it to get the best angle of a thoroughly sloshed Celestino. I almost startle when bare arms lock around my neck again and Viktor leans heavily into me. He smacks his lips several times and rocks gently.

 

Twisting to look at him, I readjust my earlier estimate of ‘a little drunk’. Viktor is entirely plastered and I suspect only his youth and fitness are saving him from the same fate as Celestino. He gazes glassily back.

 

“There are people Yuri. Behind you. People.” He motions with an incline of his head, eyes flickering to look behind me.

 

Leo De La Iglesia and Ji Guang-Hong are stood at the edge of our booth, just staring. Guang-Hong’s cheeks are flushed dark and he seems unsure of where to rest his gaze.

 

“Uh hi,” Leo tries. “Is Celestino-“

 

“He’s wasted!” Phichit replies delightedly, swiping through his various incriminating pictures.

 

“I’m really sorry about this. I think they’ve just had too much to drink.” I try to untangle Viktor’s arms but they just tighten.

 

“Is there a hot springs?” His lips bump against my cheek, alcohol heating his breath to fire on my skin. “Hasetsu, I want to go. Can we go to the hot spring?”

 

“I’m not sure that they’ve got a hot spring here, we should probably get back though.”

 

“To Hasetsu?”

 

“No- to our room. Can you get your shirt back on.”

 

“Wait,” Phichit glances up from his phone “you guys are sharing a room?” His grin curls dangerously.

 

Viktor twists to reply and I take the opportunity to jerk his shirt down over his head, it serves the dual purpose of distracting him from answering.

For several long moments I watch him try to rally the coordination to get his arms into his sleeves. His face creases with concentration but intervention becomes a necessity.

 

“Do you share a bed too?”

 

“Goodbye Phitchit,” I fix him with a level glare that he remains joyfully oblivious to.

“Uh bye Leo, Guang-Hong, sorry about... this. Good luck tomorrow.”

 

And I get a hand under Viktor’s arm to haul him to his feet. Once vertical, he quickly discovers how little control his has over his extremities and I become a crutch.

 

“ty khorosho pakhnesh” he murmurs, lips sloppy and lax, the Russian slipping out.

 

It’s a short walk to the hotel; enough that I don’t bother to flag down a passing taxi. The cold bite of the night seems to clear his daze anyway.

Overhead, the moon is a bright blur, entirely obscured by cloud. Viktor is transfixed anyway. Long neck twisted up and lashes glittering with every delayed blink.

 

“Prekrasnyy.”

 

“What does it mean?”

 

I catch his attention slowly and it takes several seconds for the question to process. For his tongue to decide on the right language.

 

“Beautiful.”

 

-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ‘ty khorosho pakhnesh'’ translates to ‘you smell good.’ btw


	12. Unscathed

Laid prone in bed, my heart is a deafening pound through my whole body. Surely shaking the bed frame. Rattling the walls.

It was madness.

 

My short program had scored highest. I’d shown them that I deserved to be there. That I deserved Viktor.

 

The trusting calm of his face before I’d gone onto the ice, fills my mind now. The assurance.

Unlike the other coaches with their fervent hype, just a palm fitted over mine and a soothing thumb over my knuckle. Slow, repetitive. There’d been this lack of urgency in his expression and it had overcome me. I’d needed to know that he’d stay, that he’d be watching whatever happened.

 

And I’d just pushed my face against his. Felt his hair against my forehead, saw the surprised twitch in his eyes. Perhaps he’d thought I was going to kiss him. God I should have.

 

The sheets feel like they are melding with my skin and I twist uncomfortably. Can’t settle. Can’t distract myself into sleep.

 

His breath is a whistle across the room, slow and lulling, trying to tease me into a slumber.

But I’m strung. Restless and buzzing within myself. Tearing the paper of my skin with my own agitation.

 

Sleep doesn’t come.

 

 

-

 

 

“I know!” I shout and it rings through the whole parking lot. Bouncing between the cars and evolving into this eerie broken thing.

 

The tears are hot and rapid on my cheeks and I expect them to burn. Leave gashes of hurt evidenced in my skin. Viktor just watches and he is a world away from the man of yesterday wearing certainty like a garment.

Now he’s stuttering and unsure. Moving like I’m thin ice he’s taking his first steps on.

 

He’d wanted to push me- perhaps thinking that I would push back.

Instead I shattered.

Splintering violently, half hoping a fragment catches him and half hoping he’s unscathed.

 

A sobbed breath rips out of me and I see him flinch at the sound.

He’s so inexperienced and I can’t think of anything but how my mother or Minako or even Celestino would know what to do. They’d wrap me up in an embrace that quietens the world, slows the thrum of my chest to something tameable.

 

Viktor keeps twitching forward like he wants to touch me but doesn’t and then just turns away.

“I’m not very good with people crying, I don’t know what to say.”

 

And I want to scream _anything_ , say anything. It’s not just the tears, it’s me behind them!

But I’m hunched, trying to hold back the spasms of my sobs. Trying to find that calm place Celestino always wanted me to go to.

 

“Should I just kiss you or something?” And god he’s trying, he really is- but he’s a child attempting to comfort a parent without even understanding the notion of sadness.

 

“No! Just- just have more faith that I’m going to win than I do.” Because that’s all I’m asking for. Support, unconditional support that doesn’t buckle when I do.

“And you don’t have to say anything, just stay close to me, Viktor.”

 

His eyes are shocked and wide, taking in my still shuddering form. I drop my head and breathe slowly but the urgency has blown through and now calm is rebuilding it’s settlements.

 

There’s no anger, possibly there never was, but I feel the embers turning white as if a fire had blazed past recently. Straightening up, I dry my cheeks with my sleeve and the material darkens.

 

Viktor watches me and I see now that he listened. He’s going to stay close, his eyes are telling me that.

 

“We should be getting back.” I venture quietly.

 

He purses his lips and nods once. Waiting for me to start towards the stairs before he falls in beside me. It feels almost normal, making our way back, him slowing slightly because he knows he has longer legs.

Except that there’s still heat in my face and the stick of dried tears around my lashes, the tense quiet.

 

As we near the rink, his hand comes up to settle on my shoulder and I let that one piece of contact between us comfort me. It isn’t squeezing or coddling, just resting. Perhaps serving as some protection against the cameras and reporters than wriggle around to watch us.

 

And then I’m stepping onto the ice, a few preemptive cheers starting up. I wonder if they can tell I’ve been sobbing, that Viktor had just spilt me in two.

Makkachin is held out for me to take a tissue from and I do, subtly wiping the lingering tears and blowing my nose. I go to drop the tissue into his outstretched hand when I’m stuck with a sudden reckless thought.

 

The balled up tissue falls, deliberately bypassing his hand and I watch as he dives for it, that silver head lurching forward.

 

I pounce, index finger poking firmly in the exposed crown of his head, just as he had prodded at my anxiety. An insecurity for an insecurity.

 _You’re an idiot_ , it says, and then I pat the top lightly, _but I forgive you._

 

-

 

I finish to deafening applause. It feels real and alive, ballooning in my chest. It wasn’t perfect but it was mine. Deliriously beautifully mine.

 

And then he kisses me, leaps forward and catches my mouth, in front of the crowds and the camera but it’s just us sharing a breath for this single frozen moment. The rush of the skate is nothing against his lips.


	13. Eros- and agape?

I shift lightly, half conscious. _What had I been dreaming about again?_ There’d been a body- below me, warm and writhing in the best way. That heated way that begins from the inside and snakes through you like a delicious shudder. It had been kissing me endlessly, loops of tongue and wet. And I was gasping with a muddle of contentment and arousal.

 

The sheets sticking to my body tug at my consciousness and as I move the aches join them. There’s the tick of the hotel clock on the wall and cars passing below. Beside me, the bed is empty.

 

But my tongue is tacky with dry and there’s slow breathing across the room.

When I sit up, the walls wobble on their axis just enough to let me know I’m still a little drunk, that the water on the nightstand will taste like ichor.

Of course- we’d gone out drinking after my free program, my silver medal.

 

At Viktor’s insistence naturally. He’d bought shots of some Chinese liquor I didn’t recognise, stumbled in close enough that our noses bumped and I’d thought back to that kiss on the ice with everyone watching. Made me laugh until my stomach was spasming with hiccups and threatening to retrieve my lunch.

In the stumble back to our room, his mouth had been melded to mine. Hot slow vodka kisses.

 

Inside, I’d pushed him back against the door, swept the silver from his eyes just so I could see how heavy his lashes were with every blink. How dark his eyes had gone.

But I was steadied and held back with firm hands, we were _too drunk, especially for our first time_ , he’d insisted even as his eyes tracked my mouth.

I think I’d snorted and crudely reminded him that I was certainly _not_ a virgin.

 

But he was steadfast, wanted us to be clear headed. Not a drunken quicky.

 

And so here we were, asleep in separate beds. Except that I want him so badly I’m shivering with it. His eyes had been so heavy in my dream, slitted with lust, and his mouth-

 

He shifts restlessly and it would be nothing to pad across there. Wake him slowly. The haze of drink has dulled, that’s what he’d wanted right?

 

Some streetlight has bled between the gaps in the hastily pulled curtains; is now stencilling his frame in yellows and ochres. Painting his hair with foreign colours. It captures the turn of his face towards mine and bare stretch of his shoulders where the sheets don’t reach.

The part of his lips.

I’m moving towards his bed before I even consciously decide.

 

Sleepy snuffles meet me when I pull back the sheet and wriggle in next to him. A discontented grumble at the brief chill. But then he’s nudging closer to the warmth and his lashes flicker vacantly. I stroke his cheek to feel the light edge of blonde stubble coming in, just as he blinks awake.

 

“Yuri?” It’s so rough, just as low and devastating as that first day at the Inn. I catch his mouth, only lightly, letting our lips stick a second too long. He smiles and it’s probably also still a little drunk but it’s so pleasantly Viktor that I can’t help but kiss him again. Mouth opening, his fingers tighten on my shirt, fuse our chests.

 

“You woke me for this?” Viktor murmurs into the dark.

 

“I was having a dream.”

 

“Oh... a good dream?”

 

He takes the sigh into his mouth as a reply and douses us in gasoline, lights a match against my thigh. Kisses back with a stuttering fever that solidifies this as foreplay.

 

It overtakes my dream; the certainty of his fingers up my shirt and the hammering reality of his chest.

I’d been hard since the dream and still, that first shunt of requited excitement against me, is as wounding as it is thrilling. Eros incarnate, and he wants me.

 

His hands are rough and deliberate as they skim my body, thumbing the nooks of my hipbones with fervour, sliding under my waistband to palm my ass and establish a rhythm to our desperate grinding.

 

I’m ablaze in his arms. Clutching and rolling; gasping for the taste. Snatching and wrenching at his clothes until they’re riven and skin is heating my palms.

I couldn’t hold him any closer.

Each breath is a damp rasp that I’ve torn from his chest for him to deposit against my throat like an offering.

 

Through the half light I catch screwed up eyes, a parted mouth and hair that’s strewn with abandon, tumbling moonlight onto the pillow.

He stiffens- pushing impossibly tight and hard one last time before choking sin into my ear. Twitching when I don’t stop moving. And I’m so fucking close that as his mouth finds mine again and I feel the wetness of his boxers on my stomach I’m already coming.

 

The delirious heat and rush of it all simmers and there’s just a warm body around me and the residual pulse in my cock. He hums into my hair, sated and content. Across the room my shirt hangs haphazardly from a chair but I don’t even remember losing it.

 

“Mmm you’re like fire sometimes, Yuri.”

 

I wriggle my head so I can catch his eye, but get stuck on the soft smile halfway up. It’s so tender and unexpected like seeing blossom at nighttime and half expecting it to have folded up to sleep.

 

“I don’t think so.” I say, face nestled back against his chest where I can count the gradual slowing of his heart. The damp underwear is definitely getting uncomfortable now.

 

“Nyet, you’re wrong. Maybe you don’t see but it’s there. Same with Eros. There all along...” His words are dragging and for a moment I think he’s still drunk before I realise he’s falling asleep, in my arms. Almost afraid to move, lest I disturb him, I wait as his limbs gradually slacken and his breathing evens.

 

His fingers twitch subtly against my back and I wish I could see his face, see the minute flutters in his expression as dreams take him. My chest feel warm; full in the best way.

 


End file.
